Warehouse 13 Wednesday: Season 5 Begins To End

This past Monday (14 April) Warehouse 13 returned to SyFy Channel for the beginning of the end of Season 5. This past year I have had real mixed emotions about this whole "last season" business. I love the show and am very saddened that the network decided to pull the plug on the show around this time last year. This season is very bittersweet as it is the final season. I am glad that Sci-Fi had the decency to announce the cancellation before the final season had been filmed so that the writers and production staff could finish things off. Sometimes shows have been canceled with no warning after they had wrapped up the final episodes (Eureka and Alphas anyone?)

I wasn't sure if I was going to do a review of the Season 5 premier or not. I guess I'm going to do a mini-review.

EPISODE: 5.1 "Endless Terror"

Original Air Date: 14 April 2014

CLAUDIA: "Looks like your warehouse still has a little bit of a crush on me."

Warning: This review may contain spoilers

This was a fantastic episode I hope the rest of the season keeps me as interested as this one did. Last season there were a couple of episodes that were about 3/4 interesting and the rest of the episode had me thinking of what websites I need to surf to when the show ended. This episode kept me wanting more and cursing the commercial breaks. I am looking forward to late May when the DVD will be released. Supposedly the Season 5 DVD will have the Christmas episode from the end of Season 3 "The Greatest Gift" which currently is only available on the Region 2 DVD release. But I digress before I even began.

Endless Terror begins where last season left off with a cliff-hanger of course. Claudia was confronting Paracelsus (Anthony Head) who had just taken control of the Warehouse and evicted the team. He starts throwing dangerous artifacts or shooting their projectiles at her and she uses other artifacts to block or counter the attacking artifact. Soon Paracelsus realizes that the Warehouse is protecting Claudia because she is its caretaker, he also realizes since he controls the Warehouse he can control Claudia and he does (with the assistance of an artifact of course).

With Claudia's unwilling assistance Paracelsus collects and hooks up some artifacts to H.G. Wells' Time Machine to create a time portal to the past. Meanwhile the team after some failed attempts at gaining entry back into the warehouse with some humorous results, do finally gain access to the warehouse. The team still needs to regain control of the warehouse. To do that they need to split up, Pete and Steve are confronted by the Paracelsus Minion Claudia, who warns them about each of the artifacts she is using against them with some humorous dialogue. Artie and Myka go into the depths of the warehouse to the nerve center to realign the controlling flames that need to be in their proper alcoves they had been removed from to create the ring of fire Paracelsus' control had made them into. Once the flames are returned to their proper places Paracelsus no longer has control over Claudia, but he manages to escape into the time portal he has created.

Before the team can chase Paracelsus through the time portal the warehouse has been transformed. Gone is the steampunk antique mechanical designs to be replaced by shiny high-tech digital and computerized fixtures. They discover that he made changes in the past to not only become caretaker of Warehouse 9 as before, but he also has killed the regents from that time to become the caretaker for all the Warehouses from 9 up to 13.

Pete and Myka go back to Warehouse 9 while Artie goes off to confront the modern Paracelsus instructing Claudia and Steve to stay behind and keep the time portal open for Pete and Myka. Claudia follows Artie leaving Steve to fend for himself. Upon arrival in the past Pete and Myka are met by Lisa Da Vinci (Rebecca Mader) and accused of murdering the warehouse guards and plotting to kill the regents (who haven't yet been killed when they arrive in the past).

Meanwhile in the alternate present Artie is captured by the warehouse security force that is enhanced by artifacts that Paracelsus has duplicated and are lead by Benedict Valda (Mark Sheppard). Paracelsus throughout his reign as warehouse caretaker has experimented with artifacts on innocent people to advance the warehouse technology and increase his overall power. His medical staff includes some familiar faces; Doctor Vanessa Calder (Lindsey Wagner) and Hugo Miller (Rene Auberjonois) who in this alternate timeline are married and are forced to work under Paracelsus to keep their children alive.

Pete and Myka with Lisa Da Vinci's help, save the regents from the past, defeat Paracelsus and rebronze him. Rebronzing Paracelsus in the past cause the Paracelsus of the present to bronze once the changed ripples of time get to it.

The team goes about settling down for the evening winding down from the latest adventure, Artie while putting away artifacts notices that one of the artifact forks from the silverware set he is putting away is missing. He brushes it off with a sort of "oh well" attitude. We as the audience are then shown Valda holding the missing fork someplace else, setting up things for next week's episode or possibly later.

Series Regulars:
Pete Lattimer (Eddie McClintock)
Myka Bering (Joanne Kelly)
Artie Nielsen (Saul Rubenik)
Claudia Donovan (Allison Scagliotti)
Steve Jinks (Aaron Ashmore)
Mrs. Frederic (CCH Pounder)
Abigail Cho (Kelly Hu)

Guest Cast:
Paracelsus (Anthoney Head)
Hugo Miller (Rene Auberjonois)
Vanessa Calder (Lindsey Wagner)
Benedict Valda (Mark Sheppard)
Lisa Da Vinci (Rebecca Mader)

Season Five has started off with a big bang. I hope that the rest of the season continues to be as exciting and as powerful as this episode was. I wish the network executives hadn't pulled the plug on this wonderful series. I would really like to see the series live on in some form perhaps in the form of novels and some audio adventures.

I give this episode 4 Warehouse artifacts ****

Warehouse 13 Wednesday: All The Time In The World

EPISODE 4.19: "All The Time In The World"

Original Air Date: 01 July 2013

PETE: "We can't just go digging holes all over Istanbul."

 Warning: This review certainly contains spoilers

This episode was a fun episode but was not as exciting as some of the other Season Four episodes.  Some fans of the show already disagree with me and think the whole season stinks. I think the second half has been one of the best half seasons. I had to alter my Spoiler Warning notice slightly due to the fact that this episode continues from the previous episode "Lost & Found" and relies on that episode and a few other recent episodes for the plot and some of the guest character backgrounds and IDs. There were some facts from "Lost & Found" that I did not want to reveal in my review last week but due to their importance to this episode's main plot I am forced to reveal for this one. Please excuse me for that.

OK so to start things off with a Bang and a Boom we know from last episode that Nick (Josh Blaylock) has freed Paracelsus (Anthony Head) from the Bronze sector and that they have now bronzed Claudia. One of the facts from last episode I didn't want to spoil, but is a major plot point ***SIGH***. Using some artifact that wasn't explained Nick shows Paracelsus a Reader's Digest vision of the last few hundred years to bring him up to speed. They leave and later the team assumes that Nick has been kidnapped by Paracelsus.

Steve is first on the scene to discover Bronze Claudia and notifies Artie and the team with the disturbing news. Using a recording of a warehouse artifact a durational spectrometer to try to figure out what Nick and Paracelsus were up to. Shortly after viewing the recording, Myka notices that several artifacts are missing from the inventory. They try unsuccessfully to debronze Claudia but the Bronzing Machine isn't working. The reason Artie discovers is that the bronze statue (Stele) that powers the machine is gone. They find a note on the inside of the panel that held the bronze stele that says "Sutton knows what I want". So it is off to find Sutton (James Marsters).

Through flashbacks from a few centuries ago we learn that Paracelsus is responsible for making Nick and his parents Charlotte (Polly Walker) and Sutton immortal by using an artifact known as The Philospher's Stone (a geode). Artie and the team had found half of the stone last episode. After being made immortal the stone was cut in two by Sutton years ago and he made a ring out of some of the crystal inside that gave him the power to revive dead plants. At the bed and breakfast where they are holding Charlotte, we also learn that Paracelsus is Sutton's brother. In an odd sort of way that helps explain why he chose them for his immortality experiments. In the flashbacks he explains that he need a man, a woman and a child, to see how gender and age are affected by the process. Charlotte explains that over the centuries she and Nick have learned how difficult it is for him to be stuck in immortality at age fifteen stuck between childhood and being a man. Both Charlotte and Nick wish for him to become mortal again to end his eternal suffering of not being able to love someone naturally.

The need to debronze Claudia is made more urgent due to deterioration due to Paracelsus using the bronze stele directly and not the bronzing chamber. The team needs to save Claudia super fast. Mrs. Frederic (CCH Pounder) tells Artie that there are some restricted files that she needs to find to help the situation, and that will explain the mystery surrounding Paracelsus. Artie and Steve notice that Mrs. F. is walking away instead of her usual vanishing act. She discovers that the files she needed were redacted. She also seems to be quickly developing dementia. Regent Mr. Kosan explains to Artie that as the caretaker of the warehouse she is "hardwired" into it and he takes him to the heart/nerve center of the warehouse where they discover a problem that is causing Mrs. F's rapid development of dementia and declining health.

Several artifacts are used to try to help stabilize Claudia until they can unbronze her which they eventually are able to do successfully. Through Mr. Kosan we learn that there is a Keeper of the warehouse who is the "living memory" of the warehouse that can access the redacted information from the files concerning Paracelsus. It turns out that the keeper is Abigail (Kelly Hu). It is through her that we discover the actual cause of Mrs. F's condition and another secret of Paracelsus that will of course be partly carried out in next week's episode which is the season finale and a big end of season cliffhanger. I'll keep some of that info under my hat until next week's review.

I give this episode 3 Warehouse artifacts ***